Comedic essays on ship life and life in general from Jeff "The Fun Dude" Shaw, comedy club manager for a really fun cruise line that rhymes with "Barnival." Enrich your existence with sage observations from a middle-aged man who sleeps in bunk beds. (JTFD's humorous opinions are his own, exaggerated for comedic effect, and intended to insult neither the company he loves nor the loyal customers who make his job so much fun. In other words: If you think Jeff's a dick, don't double-click!)

Although there’s a lot to do when your ship’s at sea, new and wondrous adventures await you ashore. Have the urge to remain on the ship and eat yourself into a coma while everyone else is wasting time in port? Snap out of it, Skipper! You’re not (just) some fat and lazy American on vacation; you’re an intrepid explorer in search of danger and excitement—so slather on that sunblock, suck up that gut and whip out that American Express card, because an intrepid adventurer such as yourself is going to want to splurge on some shore excursions for you and your family so you can actually go out and experience—not just visit—the ports. Unless, of course, your idea of a good time is wandering aimlessly around a port area that is the mother of tourist traps screaming, “No! No! No! Yes! No! Yes! Hell no! Hell yes!” to locals trying to sell you fake jewelry, cheap T-shirts, imitation leather goods, marijuana, wood carvings, prostitutes, wool blankets in summertime and Mexican wrestling masks.

So in order to help you maximize your fun in the sun, here are five of the most popular shore excursions for you to choose from:

Excursion # 1: swimming with the dolphins. Dolphin encounters are some of the most popular excursions offered by any cruise line because they allow cruise aficionados such as yourself to treat your family to an experience of a lifetime. In fact, millions of Americans are sailing to the Caribbean this year for the warm sunshine, enchanting evening breezes, sapphire waters, and the chance to swim with cute and cuddly dolphins that weigh 1,100 pounds and can crush a small child like a warm M & M. But despite what the critics might say, swim-with-the-dolphin programs are a great opportunity for dolphins, the second-most intelligent creatures in the world to bond with tourists, the least intelligent creatures in the world.

Swim-with-the-dolphin excursions have become increasingly popular in the Caribbean in the past ten years or so and the dolphins dig it, too. A former dolphin trainer, who spoke candidly with me on the condition that I twist his words around, told me that dolphins love being in captivity where they can perform the same boring tricks over and over again with overweight tourists and their snot-nosed offspring holding onto their fins as they bang their sensitive snouts on the walls of their claustrophobic pens instead of swimming free in deep blue ocean, where the only tourists they’ll meet are drunk cruisers who fall overboard.

“Dolphins are beautiful and amazing creatures in their natural habitat,” the trainer told me. “But stick them in a cage, and they become sad, frustrated and aggressive, making it that much easier for them to relate to humans.”

Excursion # 2: snorkeling and scuba diving. Snorkeling is a particularly popular activity among junior cruisers because kids are less apt to be unpleasantly surprised at how nut-tuckingly cold the water in the Caribbean can be, less apt to become disappointed or angry when unusually strong currents make it difficult to observe underwater life, and less apt to get upset when their eyes are flooded with stinging salt water because their parents were too tipsy to properly adjust their masks for them.

The primary appeal of snorkeling for parents is that it doesn’t require the expense, equipment and training required for scuba diving. But if honest-to-goodness scuba diving is more your thing, then you’ll have to get certified first if you want to dive on your own. If you’re not certified, then you’ll have to either dive with a guide or get hired as an uncertified guide for other non-certified tourists.

Shore excursion # 3: zip-lining.

Are you overweight, out of shape and afraid of heights? Then this is the excursion for you. If you don’t have fun, then your bored guides certainly will because they can definitely use a good laugh.

Shore excursion # 4: parasailing.

Each year, an estimated three to five million people participate in parasailing. This popular activity is one of the most exciting things you can do in port because it’s largely unregulated with serious accidents frequently caused by faulty equipment. There are: no federal regulations or guidelines that establish specific training or certification for parasailing operators; no requirement for inspection of the parasailing equipment; and no requirement to shut down operations during nasty weather conditions. For these reasons alone, serious thrill seekers are sure to get their money’s worth.

If you’re still not sold on the idea of being suspended 500 above the ocean’s surface, where something as simple as a weak towline, strong winds, or a worn harness can cause a tragic accident, then perhaps the fact that there no are rules or laws preventing you from buying a half-priced bottle of tequila at the duty free shop and drinking it during your flight might seal the deal.

Shore excursion # 5: Jet Skis and ATVs. Can’t decide between renting a Jet Ski or a four-wheeler, then get a package deal so you can do both in one day. That way, you can break your neck and your back. (And then rent a Rascal scooter back on the ship.)

So don’t just lounge around Lido Deck, nursing your strawberry daiquiri; book a shore excursion today! There’ll be plenty of time for lounging when you’re in traction in the ICU.

You can read all the online articles you want about the crime and violence in popular ports of call such as St. Thomas and Jamaica, but I’m here to remind you that St. Thomas for one is actually part of America. That means it’s no more dangerous than, say, Camden, New Jersey.

But just because some ports have dangerous areas doesn’t mean anything’s going to happen to you. Sure, you might get shot or stabbed at an ATM but at least you’ll have pretty coconut trees to look up at while you’re lying on the ground bleeding to death.

Jamaica, coincidentally, is where Angela Basset filmed the movie “How Stella Got Her Groove Back.” I can’t remember exactly how Stella got her groove back, but I can tell you how she lost it: Stella left her groove in the trunk of a rental car in Montego Bay and that groove got jacked, Jack.

I wasn’t prepared for how filthy Jamaica is, either. Litter everywhere. Then again, with as much pot that’s smoked in that country, I guess it shouldn’t be much of a surprise to see thousands of candy wrappers blowing in the wind. If you ask me, we should give our ship’s entire Housekeeping Department the morning off in Montego Bay. They’d have that whole city spic and span in three hours and still be back in time to clean up after you messy bastards before lunch.

All jokes aside, if you go exploring in Caribbean ports make sure you travel with a large group of other tourists. You ‘ll fell a lot less frightened and intimidated if you’re not the only person being robbed at gunpoint.

Most islanders will bristle at American travel advisories. They’ll ask how we can call their port cities dangerous when America has Cleveland and Detroit. I’ll keep that in mind the next time I drop two grand on a seven-day cruise on Lake Erie.

The other problem with crime in the Caribbean is that criminals are rarely caught. It’s easier to catch Ebola than a purse snatcher. There was more justice in 1964 Selma than in modern day Honduras, for example. Of the last 50 Americans killed in Honduras, the local police have solved just 2 cases. Their top detectives determined that one victim was killed by a murderer and the other was murdered by a killer.

Because a forewarned traveler is a safe traveler, here’s…

The Fun Dude’s Top Ten List of Ports to Watch Your Ass In:

St. Lucia: Armed robberies are so common on this island that a local tour company offers a shore excursion where you can ride around the city in a double-decker bus and watch actual crimes in progress, giving new meaning to the phrase, “mugging for the camera.”

El Salvador: El Salvador has one of the highest murder rates in the world. But then again, you can get a kick-ass mango daiquiri for dirt cheap. So don’t let anybody scare you out of getting your drink on.

United States Virgin Islands (USVI):The U.S. Virgin islands are filled with so many guns, drugs, robberies, that most Americans should feel right at home.

Antigua: Although Antigua may seem like a tropical paradise, it’s seen more than its share of tragedies. For example, Justin Bieber vacationed there once and nothing happened to him.

St. Kitts: James Bond refuses to go there anymore ever since he walked outside his hotel and found his Aston Martin up on blocks.

Mexico: Kidnappings and be-headings don’t usually happen in the tourist areas, which makes seeing one at the Hard Rock Café in Acapulco that much more special.

Guatemala: Guatemala is not a place where you should think of going for a leisurely stroll through the back streets. You’d be better off rollerblading through South Central Los Angeles.

Venezuela: Venezuela also has one of the highest murder rates. One American cruise passenger was killed simply for wearing a fanny pack. (So at least this guy had it coming.)

Honduras: Like many other Caribbean islands, the police are either corrupt or incompetent. So this is where big city police departments from the States come down every spring to scout new recruits.

Bahamas: The U.S. State Department has issued numerous crime warnings for the Bahamas. The second you step off the cruise ship you’re likely to be offered drugs. Fortunately, those drugs will most likely be Lipitor and Viagra so at least Bahamian drug dealers know their market.

Minimizing Your Risks

Here are some safety measures you can take to reduce the risk of becoming a victim while on vacation:

Travel in groups of two or more. Never get into a taxi with a passenger already inside, even when offered a chance to split the fare. The driver and the “passenger” may be in cahoots. (Guys, “cahoots” is a variety of Capri pants.)

Keep a low profile. You can achieve this by either dressing inconspicuously or by signing up for a My Space account.

Do not wear a fanny pack (especially in Venezuela). If you don’t wind up being robbed of your money, you’ll be robbed of your dignity.

Never put valuable items in a backpack, unless you’re a man and it’s a Hello Kitty backpack, in which case your assailants will be too busy laughing to actually rob you.

Moreover, men, never carry your billfold in your back pocket. Samuel L. Jackson isn’t the only person who wants to know what’s in your wallet. I recommend a trick novelty wallet that shoots out a fake rubber serpent. That way, if Samuel L. Jackson himself ever asks you what’s in your wallet you can open it in his face and shout, “Mother-@#$-ing snakes–that’s what, beeotch!”

If you’re a woman, don’t carry your purse over your shoulder; carry it across your chest. This will cause your would-be purse snatcher to focus on your breasts instead of your purse.

Money belts are for amateurs. Nothing says “easy mark” to a pickpocket like watching somebody take their shirt off to buy a Snickers bar at a newsstand.

Take just one or two credit cards and a modicum of cash ashore with you in order to minimize your losses in case a thief takes a fancy to you. Better yet, max them all out at home, before you leave on your cruise.

Unless absolutely unavoidable, never go ashore with your actual passport; bring a photocopy of the data pages. If Guest Services won’t let you use the photo copier on the ship, you can use one at the local police station in port when you go there to report your stolen wallet.

Which reminds me: Carry a “mugger’s wallet.” This is a cheap wallet with a small amount of cash that you’ll find in your pocket after realizing that you gave the mugger your actual wallet by mistake.

Leave your cell phone in your cabin. Expensive smartphones, such as an I-Phone or Galaxy, are the most common items stolen from cruise-ship passengers. If you need to make a call, you can always steal a phone from a fellow tourist.

Most important—try to stay sober. The drunker you are, the more likely ransom-hungry kidnappers are to mistake you for Lindsay Lohan.

Although I do want you to think a little before gallivanting around a Third-World country with a fancy camera around your neck, I don’t mean to scare you into canceling your cruise. As I made clear at the start of this essay, traveling to the Caribbean isn’t any more dangerous than biking through Baltimore.

So if you exercise caution, stay aware of your surroundings, and don’t venture too far off the beaten path, you’ll be able to party your ass off without losing it or getting it kicked.

Regardless of how much money you have in the bank or how big your yearly vacation budget is, getting the lowest possible fare on a cruise is always a plus. That way you’ll have some money left over for plastic surgery so that you can shake those IRS investigators off your tail before boarding a luxurious ocean liner bound for the Cayman Islands. Unfortunately, finding good deals can be tough sometimes because a luxury cruise to a popular destination can be a little pricey, so here are six tips to help you prevent your next cruise vacation from costing you an arm and a nose job:

Book through a travel agent. If you’re worried that going through a third party will make your cruise more expensive, stop worrying. Travel agents make their money from commissions from cruise lines, wholesalers and hotels—and from all the marijuana they sell on the side, which is nothing compared to the amount they smoke. Yes, it shouldn’t surprise you that all travel agents are high all the time. That’s why they’re always telling you not to worry: “But what if one of my relatives has to cancel the cruise for any reason, such as being arrested for flying their gyrocopter into White House airspace, will I get the deposit for their fare back?” Don’t worry, dude. Just mellow out and everything’s gonna be OK, dude. “One half of my party has the 6:00pm dinner seating, one half has the 8:00pm dinner seating, and the third half is brown-bagging it. Are you sure the Maître D’ will be able to change our dining times around so we can all eat together?” All this talk of dinner is making me hungry, dude. Stay on the line while I skateboard down to Sam’s Club and snag a ten-pound bag of M & M’s, dude. Because travel agents always have access to righteous weed, they’re able to trade for special cruise deals not available to the general public, and therefore they can end up saving you big bucks on your cruise. And you don’t pay them a dime for hooking you up. Just bring them back a suitcase full of rum cake from the Bahamas and they’ll call it even, dude.

Book at the last minute. If your travel plans are flexible, you should seriously consider holding off until the last minute to book a cruise. The closer they get to the departure date, the more desperate cruise lines become to offload unsold cabins at bargain-basement rates meant to entice you into quitting your job and selling your children (try Craig’s List!) so you can just pick up and go. Since the ship is going to sail regardless of whether it’s completely full or half empty, they figure that they can’t sell nine-dollar cocktails and twenty-dollar Bingo cards to empty cabins. If you play your cards right, you can net huge savings with this strategy. However, keep in mind that some ships with popular itineraries are always going to be jam packed at certain times of the year, so be sure to read my companion piece to this essay: “Hey, Jackass—Don’t Wait till the Last Minute to Book Your Cruise!”

Cruise at the right time of the year. The best time to cruise is definitely during Spring Break. Especially if you’re older, cruising alone to just get away from it all or simply looking for a romantic vacation with that special someone. The great thing about cruising during Spring Break is that the ship will be booked to capacity either with grade-schoolers running around screaming, shouting and peeing on everything or with college kids running around screaming, shouting and peeing on everything. Either way all that screaming, shouting and peeing will make your cruise seem much more adventurous and exciting. You might even pee a little yourself.

Look into added-value promotions. Many cruise lines offer special deals that might include hotel rooms, discounted or complimentary shore excursions and perhaps even included or discounted airfare. Only problem is you’ll have to book these cruises a little in advance, say, a decade or two. You may be able to find even more added-value promotions through a travel agent, such as free Skittles and rolling papers. (If you haven’t caught on yet, all travel agents are high all the time.)

Check out cruise consolidators. If you choose to bypass a travel agent, consider checking out cruise consolidators or “bulk buyers” who buy blocks of cabins at incredible discounts. Cruise consolidators can net you considerable savings on cabins, excursions and such. Just keep in mind that all cruise consolidators work for the Mafia so if you cancel your cruise for any reason you might end up as a sightseeing stop for future divers and snorkelers.

Create a budget and stick to it. Ha-ha-ha! I’m killing me!

So there you have it. Six tips for saving money on your next cruise. As good as money in the bank. Or maybe an offshore account in the Cayman Islands.

If there’s one thing cruise ship guests hate it’s waiting in line to see a free comedy show. It fact, some guests get so mad they look like they want to hit me. Only reason they don’t is the line for beating me up is usually longer than the line for the show.

In all fairness, I can see why people on vacation wouldn’t want to wait ten minutes to see a forty-minute comedy show. These are the same people who’ll wait in a three-hour line at Six Flags for a two-minute roller coaster ride. The same people who’ll camp out on Canal Street in New Orleans at nine in the morning for a Mardi Gras parade that doesn’t start till noon and won’t reach them until four in the afternoon. The same people who’ll sleep outside an Apple Store all weekend just to buy the new iPhone even though they still haven’t figured out how to use their previous iPhone. The same people who’ll, on the first night of the cruise, spend forty-five minutes in a Free Liquor Tasting line that circles the lobby of the ship just so they can down a thimble-sized sample of Baily’s Irish Cream. So, yes, I can see why waiting ten minutes for a professional comedy show would be too much suffering for their fallen arches to endure.

There’s something about lines (or “queues,” if you’re British) that brings out the worst in people. On a nightly basis I observe grown adults cut the line, save spots for friends, nit-pick about who was standing where, push and shove, scream and shout, and then become verbally abusive (or “get all Parliamentary,” if you’re British) with me or my assistants when confronted about their behavior. Other guests will refuse to join the line altogether and try to start their own line at the exit of the comedy club, refusing to move as they’re trampled by a stampede of 600 departing guests in search of free pizza and ice cream. It’s nights like that that make me wish there were more icebergs in the Caribbean.

Some of my superiors believe that turning a blind eye to such childish behavior falls under the heading of Good Customer Service. I do not. I believe that when passengers pay for a cruise they are paying to travel on the ship, paying to sleep on the ship, paying to eat on the ship, and paying to enjoy the free live entertainment offered on the ship. They are not paying for the right to interfere with our operation, supplant our policies with their own, defy or disrespect our team members or infringe upon the fun of their fellow guests through rude, selfish or discourteous behavior. For that we charge extra.

In my opinion, passengers are called “guests” for a reason: the ship is our home and they are just visiting. In my cruise line’s opinion, however, passengers should be considered “part of the family.” Fine. But if you ask me, that’s even more of a reason for us to call guests on their crap. I’d love to see our more problematic passengers try to pull the same shenanigans in the home of a close relative and see what happens. Try telling their Aunt Clara and Uncle Eugene how to run their household, spill food on their furniture, leave dirty dishes on their stairs, make noise at all hours of the night outside their bedroom door and speak rudely or disrespectfully to them or their cousins and they’ll find themselves at a Motel 6 faster than they can say, “It may be your house but it’s my vacation.”

I love my job and I love my ship. I also love the vast majority of guests who cruise with us week after week. So, please come sail with us soon. I’ll do my part to make sure you have the best cruise ever. But, to echo something we’ve all heard our fathers say a million times while growing up: If you cruise under my roof, you cruise under my rules.

My least favorite part of being our ship’s comedy club manager is turning over the showroom between shows. A hard partying crowd of 600 people can leave enough empty beer bottles and cocktail glasses in their wake to make the Punchliner look like Motley Crϋe’s tour bus. So in order to clean the room in ten minutes or less—and to ensure that guests waiting in line for the next show can get good seats without having to shove a fellow guest overboard—we ask the audience to exit after every performance. Not surprisingly, guests are less than thrilled by this policy, because it forces them to do two activities cruise ship passengers are notoriously reluctant to engage in: following instructions and leaving the sitting position. But I find that if I attach a free drink coupon to some fishing line I can usually coax them all out eventually.

I’ve been told I should look at it at from a guest’s point of view. And I have. Their point of view is that they have the right to ignore the rules because they “paid good money to be here.” They paid good money to fill up their gas tank—does that mean they can run a red light? They paid good money to finish their basement—does that mean they can use it as a meth lab? They paid good money for their cellphone—does that mean they can take a photo of their “junk,” email it to unsuspecting women, lose their spot in Congress and then run for mayor of a major metropolitan city? (OK, bad example.)

Not every guest gives me a hard time about our policy, but those who do make my job way harder than it needs to be. These people have been on the ship less than 24 hours and yet suddenly they’re experts in running a comedy club: “I have to leave now that the show is over and people are already lining up outside for the next one and your staff needs to clean up and reset the showroom in less than ten minutes? That makes no sense!”

“Of course that makes no sense to you,” I feel like screaming back, “You’ve never set foot in our club before! But maybe if you were an experienced crowd control expert who possessed firsthand knowledge of the type of traffic flow problems our carefully considered and thoroughly tested policies and procedures have been designed to prevent, instead of a vacationer seeing live stand-up for the first time, perhaps you wouldn’t be so befuddled. You may have paid to be here but I get paid to be here, so whaddya say you keep drinking yourself blind and I’ll keep doing my job?”

I’ve never understood “that makes no sense” as a guest’s go-to objection to our shipboard policies. Of course it makes no sense: you haven’t received the same training that we have nor are you privy to the same information we are. If you were to take a trip to Dick’s Sporting Goods, I’m sure that the machine that drills holes in the bowling balls would baffle the bejesus out of you. But to the guy who has been trained to drill the holes in bowling balls, the ball hole drilling machine makes perfect sense. And maybe if he were to drill a couple of holes into your skull, it would drain enough “stupid juice” out of your noggin so that from now on you’ll no longer demand that things make sense to you immediately and instead learn how to ask intelligent questions that might lead to you having a wider frame of reference, which will lead to better understanding of our polices, which will lead to you realizing that we have your and your fellow guests’ best interests at heart and have no intention of inconveniencing you or ruining your vacation, so please stop thinking that paying for a cruise makes you a senior vice president of the cruise line.

Similarly, when I board an airplane, none of the dials or levers in the cockpit makes sense to me. Difference is, the fact that those dials and levers make no sense to me makes perfect sense to me–because I’m not a pilot! But I’m pretty sure that if I took flying lessons for a number of years, spent thousands of hours in the air before finally obtaining my commercial pilot’s license, all that technology in the cockpit would one day make perfect sense to me. I’m also pretty sure I’d be even less tolerant of idiots that I am now:

“I can’t believe we have to wait an extra twenty minutes before takeoff just because one of the engines fell off the plane—that makes no sense!”

Most cruise ships offer lots of fun-filled activities such as Bingo, shuffleboard and trivia. Granted, these are things you can do at your local senior center for free. But on a cruise you can win prizes. And nothing says “I’m a better person than the rest of you old farts” like going home with a suitcase full of plastic “ship-on-a-stick” trophies valued at twenty cents apiece.

But if you’re too busy establishing your intellectual superiority over your fellow passengers by taking first place in “TV Theme Song Trivia,” you might miss out on some more satisfying cruising experiences (such as “Movie Theme Song Trivia”). So here are some tips for getting the most out of your next cruise:

Attend the shopping talk.

The Shopping Talk is a brief (six to eight hours) seminar given by your shipboard shopping specialist “Chet,” who will provide you with valuable pointers for shopping in your ports of call. Pointers such as:

Only shop in an “approved” store so you’ll get the best deal possible—and Chet will get a commission, a bonus, and a hot oil massage with a happy ending.

Never shop in an “unapproved” store because you’ll be kidnapped by Somali pirates and/or ISIS.

Choose the buffet over the dining room.

You can’t go wrong eating in one of your ship’s fancy dining rooms, where you can feast on steak, lobster, fine wine and exotic deserts; however, the high-quality food and superior service may cause you to relax and enjoy yourself (even though you’ll be expected to wear shoes). And since finding things to complain about makes cruising much more enjoyable, you’ll be better off heading up to Lido Deck where you can fight your way through the gluttonous throng in your bare feet. Besides, later on, when you’re down at the front desk complaining about the long lines and limited selection in the buffet restaurant, not to mention the fact that you paid good money for this cruise yet nobody from the Miami offices ever called and advised you to pack footwear for formal night, the Guest Services associate on the business end of your vitriol will be more likely to offer you financial compensation if you have chili-dog breath.

Camp out in the casino.

Screw Las Vegas; spend as much time and money in the ship’s casino as possible. Cruise-ship slot machines are looser than a biker chick with a meth habit. Especially on my cruise line. In fact, you’re going to need a duffle bag to haul all those shiny silver dollars back to your cabin. And I’m not just saying that because the more money my cruise line makes off of delusional chain-smoking gambling addicts like you, the better chance I have of getting a raise.

Luxuriate in the all-ages hot tubs.

What better way to relax on a luxury cruise liner overrun by unsupervised eight-year-olds than with a nice hot urine bath?!

Book an interior stateroom.

Sure, you can spend the extra money for a balcony or at least a porthole if you want, but cruising is so much more adventurous and exciting when you cram your entire family into a tiny windowless cabin the size of your kitchen pantry at home. You’ll never know what time of day it is when you wake up, and the lack of fresh air with five people in the room will keep things interesting. And, better yet, you’ll be that much more excited about reaching the Bahamas.

Rent a mobility scooter.

Why should old folks with bad knees have all the fun? Rent a scooter for your cruise and skip to the front of every line. Crew members will take pity on you and wave you past the long parade of upright losers waiting to be seated for dinner or a production show, without so much as a second glance. Thankfully, it will never occur to them that the last person who needs to be advanced to the front of a line is someone who is—wait for it… SITTING ON A MOVING CHAIR!

What does it matter if Grandma has to wait a few extra minutes to sit down for dinner or a show if she’s already sitting down?! Allowing someone to cut in front of you because they have a scooter is like trading your seats behind home plate with somebody in the bleachers because he has binoculars hanging around his neck (or something like that only funnier).

So rent a scooter. You’ll get special treatment and you can zip around the ship drunk, running into stuff and knocking over people with actual mobility problems.

Use your cell phone as much as possible.

If there’s someone in your family whom you couldn’t afford to bring along on your cruise, be sure to call them every day that you’re at sea. The amount you’ll rack up in roaming charges will make it seem like you paid their way.

Book a cruise with one or more “tender ports.”

When a port lacks a pier big enough to accommodate cruise ships, it’s what we call a tender port. A tender is a boat that takes you from the ship to the island in the time it would take you to swim. Tendering is lots of fun because you get to wake up early, report to one of the ship’s lounges with hundreds of other tired and impatient guests, and wait for hours on end watching CNN on the big screen with the sound off (so you can hear all the screeching babies and screaming toddlers sprawled out around you) until you decide to jump overboard and swim ashore.

Once on the island, you’ll be free to slouch around in the scorching heat for ten minutes trying to find a discount T-shirt shop with functioning air conditioning until you finally realize that you’re in a third-world country that doesn’t really have all that much to see or do so you might as well get in line for a tender back to the ship, where you can be laughed at by all the experienced cruisers who stayed on board.

Purchase a shore excursion from a local vendor not in any way associated or affiliated with your cruise line so that you can either miss your non-refundable tour due to the ship arriving late or miss the ship after your tour ends because the bus carrying you back to the pier is ambushed by guerrilla fighters.

Fun times!

10. Complain. Complain. Complain.

If you really want to have fun on your cruise, don’t spend your days laying out by the pool or relaxing at the bar. Instead, make frequent trips down to Guest Services and complain about anything that comes to mind. If your complaints are inventive enough, the ship’s Guest Services associates will often offer you financial compensation just to shut you up. If you’re unlucky enough to cruise on an awesome ship like mine, however, you’ll be hard-pressed to find many legitimate issues to complain about. In that case, here are a half dozen doozies to get you started:

“The sound of the ocean keeps me up at night. Can you turn it off?”

“My cabin doesn’t look the same as the photo on your website. That cabin had blue carpet; mine has red. Can you please make the switch while I’m upstairs in the ship’s gift shop complaining about merchandise I bought on land?”

“It’s too hot on the open decks. Can you ask the Captain to turn on the air conditioning outside?”

“It’s too long of a walk between decks. Can you shorten your stairs?”

“The midnight buffet is too late at night. Can you reschedule it for noon?”

“I hate discos and disco music. Yet every time I go into the disco all I hear is disco music. Can I have a free cruise?”

So there you go. Use my tips and your next cruise is guaranteed to be your best vacation ever.

If not, you can always walk the plank. Make a big enough splash and you just might win a prize.

To get an idea of how unhelpful hecklers are, imagine if you were forced to read the above sentence while trying to read something else for pleasure. Let’s say, a Dan Brown novel:

“That’s it,” thought Langdon. “The answer was right in front of me the whole time. If one translates Beowulf from the old English into Portuguese using a code key hidden in the original handwritten lyrics of Francis Scott Keyes’ ‘Star Spangled Banner’, then the name ‘Grendel’ changes to ‘Dick Cheney’, which means the murderer has to be…” –Repeat after me: Heckling does not help a comedy show!

See how frustrating that was? Just before you could confirm your hunch that George W. Bush is the scion of Jesus of Nazareth, hell bent on destroying the Catholic Church so that he can paint over Michelangelo’s work on the Sistine Chapel with a giant portrait of himself dodging a flying shoe thrown at him by a rogue Iraqi assassin as revenge for the time he tried stealing the original Declaration of Independence as an initiation prank for the Skull and Bones Society in an attempt to uncover the conspiracy to murder General Patton, who was actually a high-ranking secret member of the Free Masons, the Druids and the Illuminati—I had to go and ruin it by thinking that what I have to say is more important or entertaining than the carefully written and edited prose of the bestselling author you paid good money to read during your valuable free time.

Why? Because I’m disrespectful and self-centered. And a member of the Illuminati.

Although the average headliner can make crushing a drunken redneck under an avalanche of well-rehearsed stock lines look easy and fun, as well as therapeutic, comedians don’t need hecklers to help them get laughs.

That’s what jokes are for. Jokes: you know, those things comedians write and perform every day for a minimum of five years before becoming a paid professional?

Hecklers always think they’re helping the show. Sometimes, they even feel as if they are the show. Unfortunately, hecklers want to be part of the show without putting in any of the hard work required to prepare, produce or promote the show. Most hecklers are so egotistical they actually think that the interplay between themselves and the comedian is somehow superior to the material the comedian has spent the past decade or so honing.

I don’t spend hours at the computer perfecting a piece of material just so an audience member who shows up five minutes late to a show can interrupt me and force me to make fun of the lime-green tank top he’s wearing on Formal Night just so he can feel like a superstar for the rest of the cruise every time somebody yells, “Hey, look it’s ‘Lime-Green Tank Top Boy’!”

We comics don’t slam hecklers in order to get laughs; we slam hecklers in order to embarrass them into silence so we can get on with our acts. Problem is most hecklers have a simplistic sense of humor. So, when a comedian whips up a witty comeback right off the top of his head, what most comics would consider a run-of-the-mill heckler slam comes across as pure comedy gold to the heckler. Therefore, the heckler reasons that in order for a comedian to drop the boring crap and start with the real jokes you have to heckle—or help—him. This reasoning is illogical because it totally ignores the opinions and preferences of the other three hundred people who paid to see the show. Without having any affiliation with the comedy club other than clipping a free coupon out of the newspaper, the average heckler decides that he knows what’s best for both the comedian onstage and the rest of the audience. The product of a perfect blend of narcissism and Long Island Iced Tea.

If heckling is so integral to an act’s success, then why don’t comedy clubs audition hecklers and book them six months in advance just like comedians? When was the last time you walked into an Improv or a Funny Bone and saw a poster that advertised: “Tonight: Marc Maron! With special guest: ‘Some drunken redneck in a Nickelback T-shirt’ ”?

Once a heckler opens his mouth, the show’s focus transfers from the performer onstage to a member of the audience who may or may not have paid to be there. Most people who pay to see a comedy show do so because they’re either a fan of stand-up comedy in general or a fan of a specific comedian:

“Jim Gaffigan is coming to the Civic Theater next month. I love that guy—let’s go online and buy tickets… (so we can sit in the front row and shout, ‘Hot Pockets’ every five seconds until Jim throws the microphone at us before running offstage to put his head in a microwave oven).”

Nobody who buys a ticket to a comedy show is paying to see the audience:

“Gee, I hope that same drunken redneck in the Nickelback T-shirt who heckled Brian Regan at the Hard Rock Casino last month shows up at the Jim Gaffigan show tonight. His non-sequiturs about Bud Light and bass fishing were way funnier than anything two of the best joke writers in North America who make millions in ticket sales every year have to say. Better yet, I hope there’s a loudmouthed bachelorette party sitting front row center. I pray that, as soon as Jim launches into a hilarious bit about how much money he spends on groceries every month feeding a family of six, some barely coherent bachelorette does one too many shots of tequila and tells Jim straight up how unfunny he his. That way he can abandon the material he’s spent the past year perfecting in order to make some hysterical, off-the-cuff comparisons between plantains and the giant penis hat that demure flower is wearing.